Adjacent Words

Ticklish definitions

	Tweet

Webster's 1828 Dictionary

TICK'LISH, a. Sensible to slight touches, easily tickled. The bottom of the foot is very ticklish,as are the sides. The palm of the hand, hardened by use, it not ticklish.
1. Tottering; standing so as to be liable to totter and fall at the slightest touch; unfixed; easily moved or affected.
Ireland was a ticklish and unsettled state.
2. Difficult; nice; critical; as, these are ticklish times.

WordNet (r) 3.0 (2005)

adj
1: difficult to handle; requiring great tact; "delicate negotiations with the big powers";"hesitates to be explicit on so ticklish a matter"; "a touchy subject" [syn: delicate, ticklish, touchy]

Merriam Webster's

adjective Date: 1581 1. a. touchy, oversensitive <ticklish about his baldness> b. easily overturned <a canoe is a ticklish craft> 2. requiring delicate handling <a ticklish subject> 3. sensitive to tickling • ticklishly adverb • ticklishness noun

Oxford Reference Dictionary

adj. 1 sensitive to tickling. 2 (of a matter or person to be dealt with) difficult; requiring careful handling. Derivatives: ticklishly adv. ticklishness n.

Webster's 1913 Dictionary

Ticklish Tic"klish, a. 1. Sensible to slight touches; easily tickled; as, the sole of the foot is very ticklish; the hardened palm of the hand is not ticklish. --Bacon. 2. Standing so as to be liable to totter and fall at the slightest touch; unfixed; easily affected; unstable. Can any man with comfort lodge in a condition so dismally ticklish? --Barrow. 3. Difficult; nice; critical; as, a ticklish business. Surely princes had need, in tender matters and ticklish times, to beware what they say. --Bacon. -- Tic"klish*ly, adv. -- Tic"klish*ness, n.

Collin's Cobuild Dictionary

1. A ticklish problem, situation, or task is difficult and needs to be dealt with carefully. So car makers are faced with the ticklish problem of how to project products at new buyers. = delicate ADJ: usu ADJ n 2. Someone who is ticklish is sensitive to being tickled, and laughs as soon as you tickle them. This massage method is not recommended for anyone who is very ticklish. ADJ

Soule's Dictionary of English Synonyms

a. 1. Easily tickled. 2. Unsteady, unstable, tottering, uncertain, precarious. 3. Delicate, nice, critical, difficult.

Moby Thesaurus

Herculean, abstruse, allergic, anaphylactic, arduous, awkward, brutal, capricious, changeable, complex, critical, dangerous, delicate, demanding, desultory, difficile, difficult, empathetic, empathic, exacting, fickle, formidable, fragile, goosy, hairy, hard, hard-earned, hard-fought, hazardous, high-strung, hyperesthetic, hyperpathic, hypersensitive, infirm, insecure, insubstantial, intricate, irritable, itchy, jawbreaking, knotted, knotty, laborious, mean, mercurial, miffy, nervous, no picnic, not easy, on slippery ground, on thin ice, operose, overrefined, oversensible, oversensitive, overtender, passible, perilous, precarious, prickly, provisional, refined, responsive, rigorous, risky, rocky, rough, rugged, sensitive, set with thorns, severe, shaky, shifting, shifty, skittish, slippery, slippy, spiny, steep, strenuous, supersensitive, sympathetic, tactful, temperamental, temporary, tender, tentative, tetchy, thin-skinned, thorny, tickling, tickly, titillative, toilsome, touch-and-go, touchy, tough, treacherous, tricky, uncertain, undependable, unfaithworthy, unreliable, unsettled, unsolid, unsound, unstable, unsteadfast, unsteady, unsubstantial, unsure, untrustworthy, uphill, variable, volatile, wicked